Palestine
Eyewitness

Neve Gordon 9oct00

The
situation here is very serious, as you know. I am not only depressed,
but beginning to be afraid of a full scale war. I wrote a very short
piece --about 500 words -- which I thought you might want to read.

I was detained on Friday for a couple of hours after "illegally
protesting and not allowing a police officer to do his duties" or
something of the sort. Apparently all the cells are full so they
released me and the other 8 Jews who were arrested. it didn't even make
the news-- so in a sense it didn't happen.

All the best, Neve

Neve Gordon teaches in the
Department of Politics and Government at Ben-Gurion University, Israel,
and can be reached at ngordon@bgumail.bgu.ac.il
.

he
echoes of gunshots were particularly loud on the evening of Yom Kippur,
the holiest Jewish holiday. Just a few hundred yards from my Jerusalem
apartment people were fighting, and the silent atmosphere that usually
characterizes the Day of Atonement was disturbed. Jewish settlers,
according to CNN, were attacking Palestinians from the northern
neighborhood Shoefat. When the Palestinians responded, the Israeli
border police intervened.

By contrast to the general impression produced by the US and Israeli
media, this conflict is by no means balanced. After all, one of the
world's most formidable military powers is quelling a popular uprising.
Since the uprising erupted on September 29th, the number of Palestinian
fatalities has constantly increased and is currently just shy of a
hundred. Over three thousand more have been wounded, many of them
children. Even during the most lethal period of the Intifada the human
toll was much lower, suggesting that Israel's open-fire regulations have
changed. During the Intifada Israeli soldiers were instructed to aim at
the lower parts of the body, while now Palestinian doctors report that
many of the bullet wounds are above the waist; it seems that Israeli
snipers are shooting to kill.

While opposition leader Ariel Sharon's provocative visit to the Moslem
shrine -- the Dome of the Rock -- triggered the rebellion, simply
blaming Sharon serves only to conceal what the fray is actually about.
Not unlike the civil rights demonstrations in the US during the 1960s,
Palestinians, both citizens of Israel and residents of the West Bank and
Gaza Strip, are protesting against racism, rampant discrimination, and
poverty. They are demanding radical social reforms that will enable them
to regain the human dignity which the existing political configuration
has undermined. Thus, to understand the current struggle one must go
beyond the recent events and examine the political structures informing
them.

But in the meantime a full-scale war is impending. During the Jewish
holiday about fifty Israeli scholars and community leaders - Jews and
Arabs -- decided to publish a petition stating that such a war can still
be avoided. We demanded:

An immediate and unilateral Israeli commitment to evacuate all the
provocative settlements and zones which are to be included within
the Palestinian state -- including the Gush Katif Area in the Gaza
Strip, Hebron and the Jordan Valley.

That Israel accept Palestinian sovereignty over all Arab
neighborhoods and Mosques inside Jerusalem, while Israel will
maintain sovereignty over the Western Wall. The city, within this
framework, will be completely open to all of its residents.

That Israel declare a strong commitment to ensuring equal rights
in every area to all Palestinian and other citizens of the state of
Israel, and that it stop shooting at citizens.

A release and exchange of all prisoners on all sides.

We concluded the petition by declaring a strong belief that only the
acceptance of this package and the immediate cessation of all violence
and threat of violence, by all populations on all sides, can prevent a
major bloodbath from taking place and serve as the basis for the
reconstruction of a mutual trust and reconciliation between the Jews,
the Palestinians and the Arab world.

It is for this that I prayed on Yom Kippur.

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